David Bercuson is a fellow of the Canadian Global Affairs Institute and director of international policy at the University of Calgary's School of Public Policy.
In her announcement that she is opposed to the Keystone XL pipeline, Hillary Clinton is undoubtedly leading the way for President Barack Obama to do the same. Despite the fact that as late as 2010 she clearly favoured the Canadian-based project, she has made a decision that is no doubt based on two partisan political factors. First, her Democratic primary opponent, Senator Bernie Sanders, is staunchly against the pipeline and Ms. Clinton needs to draw progressive votes from Mr. Sanders if she is to win the Democratic Party nomination.
Second, major progressive donors to the Democratic Party – even ones who have made fortunes from the oil and gas industry – would have been angry indeed if she had not taken the stand she did. American progressives decry the grip of big conservative money, such as that of the Koch brothers, on the Republican Party while completely ignoring the influence of left-wing billionaires on the Democratic Party.
Keystone may not ever get built, but millions of barrels of Canadian bitumen will continue to pour into the United States by rail and existing pipelines every day. Never mind that pipelines are infinitely safer than rail transport – Keystone has become a political football in the United States, not judged on its merits, or even on its possible impact on climate change (after all, even the U.S. State Department said it would be minimal). The progressive wing of the Democratic Party made it a cause célèbre to mollify environmentalists, some with big cheques, and the Republicans took the other side of the issue.
Canada and the United States are, and will continue to be, the two closest trading partners in the world. Under NAFTA, the great bulk of that trade is carried out daily, quietly, routinely and without fuss or bother. Indeed, virtually all Canadian energy exports to the U.S. proceed just as undramatically because the pipelines that were built to accommodate them were built long ago. Today there is nothing that the White House can do to stop those imports, short of abrogating hundreds of private contracts (which would be virtually impossible under U.S. law) or scrapping NAFTA. But, in this particular case, where White House approval is necessary because it is a new project, Ms. Clinton, President Obama and their many environmental supporters oppose Keystone to show how environmentally correct they are while backing oil-drilling off both U.S. coasts, in the U.S. Arctic, and exporting millions of tons of coal – surely the real "dirtiest" source of energy on the planet – every day.
At the end of the day, though, we Canadians are the ones truly at fault if the cancellation of Keystone damages our economy. Quite simply, Canada has foolishly relied on a single market for its energy exports for too long and never gave much thought to the possibility that petty partisan political conditions in the U.S. could one day hinder our exports to that country.
No one tried very hard to find other markets to Canadian oil through either the West Coast, Hudson's Bay or the East Coast. There has been a decided lack of leadership of federal governments stretching back at least 20 years in trying to build a Canadian consensus for a national export policy.
The provinces have largely acted as independent nations in considering positions to take on pipelines transiting their territory even though they don't have a constitutional leg to stand on in threatening to block such projects.
Even municipalities have gotten into the act, especially in Ontario and Quebec, in trying to impose the interests of their own local communities over a national interest.
The pipeline companies virtually ignored the First Nations concerned and saw them as unmovable obstacles rather than as potential partners in pipeline ventures that could strengthen the financial resources of those First Nations communities.
It's time for all these parties to stop dithering around. From the time the First Nations met the first European explorers and traded them furs for iron pots, Canada's economy has been highly dependent on the export of raw materials. It is now – and it will be well into the future. And oil is now a key part of those raw materials exports. But we can only do so successfully if the great majority of Canadians, who understand the connection between Canadian exports and their own standard of living, cry "enough" to our political leaders.